


Language Lessons, 3: chaleur (1200 words)

by ImpOfPerversity



Series: Language Lessons [3]
Category: Baroque Cycle - Neal Stephenson, Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: 1 Sentence Fiction, Languages, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-01-25
Updated: 2005-01-25
Packaged: 2018-11-12 12:07:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11161515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImpOfPerversity/pseuds/ImpOfPerversity





	Language Lessons, 3: chaleur (1200 words)

  
"The last place God made," said Jack Sparrow, with a gesture that would've been more grandiose if it had not been somewhat curtailed by the swaddling of shirts, jerkins, coats and cloaks in which he'd wrapped himself against the chilly air: Jack Shaftoe excused him for it (and for a great deal else), for Sparrow, after all, was accustomed to the balmy Caribbean climate, and seemed to feel the cold rather more than Jack himself, who -- whether due to nature or to nurture, or to the company he now kept -- was hardly suffering at all; true, his gloved hands ached with the cold, and the cooking-fires in this little village, where Sparrow had come to bargain for food and geography, seemed to burn with a thin and chilly flame, but there was still warmth at the core of him (Jack smiled to himself, remembering the deliciously _literal_ fact of this image, last night in Jack Sparrow's newly-widened bed, as Sparrow had pushed himself ever deeper within ...): "Mr Shaftoe?" said Sparrow now, with a quizzical lift (Jack could just see it, under his hat-brim) of one eyebrow, and Jack shrugged and grinned and said, "Just thinking of ..." and let his voice trail away; he saw Sparrow comprehend him, and grin back, and lean close to murmur, "Ah, just you wait, mate, just you wait: I'll be having more of your warmth tonight, eh?" and Jack, surprised from his cupiscent reverie, said aloud, "But 'tis _you_ who warms _me_ :" Sparrow hushed him, and turned back to the Indian he was trading with -- a big man, his skin a mauvish-grey (like the wide, wide sky above) from the cold, who did not smile and spoke only in numbers, _Spanish_ numbers, so 'twas not as though he'd understood Jack Shaftoe's indiscretion, never mind the way he was looking at the two of 'em -- and concluded his transaction, accepting a large cloth-wrapped bundle of what Jack took to be meat of some sort, and handing the man a little sack-cloth bag that jangled too readily to be any kind of money; Jack remembered Sparrow gathering up scrap-metal and broken nails from the armoury, before they'd come ashore, and glanced around him at the hovels all built of woven branches, and mud, and leaves; 'twas plain that these people had no tools to speak of, no iron but what they could beg or trade or steal, and Jack stepped closer to Sparrow, suddenly colder than ever at the mere thought of living thus in such a place, where the sun never seemed to shine -- though it _might_ , he supposed, at midsummer -- and the sky was wide and grey and grim, and a full moon hung pallidly over sharp-peaked mountains to the East; the gritty grey soil beneath his boots seemed to emanate ice that sought out the marrow of his bones, and chilled him through, and he needed, oh he needed, to be closer, close as could be, to Jack Sparrow: he nodded curtly to the Indian (whose kin, if any, were all hidden away from this piratical trading-party) and fell into step beside Sparrow, eager to be afloat again; "'Tis you," he picked up the argument, "who warms me, Jack;" Sparrow looked at him askance from under his hat, and grinned -- the steam of his breath near enough to warm Jack -- and said, "Don't reckon I'm up to warming anyone, Mr Shaftoe, not at this precise moment; but in your case I'm always willing to attempt it;" "I'm happy to hear that, Captain Sparrow," said Jack, scrambling into the gig and cursing absentmindedly as he got a bootful of icy seawater from a misjudged wave; there was something itching at the back of his mind, distracting him, and he frowned and muttered to himself -- "What's that you said?" enquired Stone, the nearest of the oarsmen, and Jack shook his head; "Just trying to remember something, mate;" "What language is that, then?" and Jack would've snapped at him, but Sparrow was listening, and looking intrigued, and 'twas a fair question, so he said only, "'tis the zargon, mate, a kind of _hot-pot_ of different tongues; they speak it everywhere in Christendom;" "I never heard of it," said Stone grumpily, as though this were a personal affront, and splashed his oar clumsily; and by the time everyone had complained of getting wet, the _Black Pearl_ was looming darkly above them against the pearly grey sky, and Jack could swing himself up the sea-ladder and head for their cabin, intent on ridding himself of his soggy boot, his damp coat and the gloomy chill that suffused him: 'twas no surprise to him, mere moments after closing the door behind him -- by Christ, but the cabin reeked of semen and sweat, and Jack felt some parts of his anatomy warming with remarkable rapidity -- that the door opened again, and admitted Sparrow, grinning, and already stripping off and casting aside layer after layer of ice-rimed attire; "Come, Jack, I'm cold; won't you warm me up?" he said with a leer, and Jack beamed back at him and said, "Come here, then, and I'll tell you a secret;" "I love secrets!" exclaimed Sparrow, casting himself down upon the cot in a wanton sprawl, arms spread wide awaiting Jack; and Jack, still standing, leaned down over him and whispered against his ear, " **chaleur** "; "Shallow?" cried Sparrow, apeing outrage, "what's shallow about my wanting you right ... here, next to me ...", and he drew Jack down beside him, whitened fingers slow to find the fastenings of his jerkin; "no, mate, **chaleur** ," said Jack, laughing at his love's affront, "'tis a word in the zargon -- nay, 'tis French, and proof that a good thing comes from them from time to time," (this being an old argument of theirs, Jack contending that a thousand years of Frankish civilisation, though inevitably flawed by the French character, had produced some worthy creations, mainly though not exclusively of a comestible nature, while Sparrow argued that the Spanish -- responsible, as far as Jack could tell, for Jesuits, the Spanish Inquisition, and _sherry_ , or good wine gone wrong -- were more praiseworthy); " **chaleur** , eh?" said Sparrow now; "so what's that mean?" and Shaftoe, delighting in this rare and marvellous opportunity to instruct Jack Sparrow, said, "Why, Jack, it's you, so it is; that warmth and heat and glow and light and, o, everything;" and Jack Sparrow, his breath hot on Jack's neck, his cold hands paradoxically warming Jack's chilled skin, and the heat in his eyes warming every last corner of Jack's soul, could never simply agree; "No, love, 'tis what we make between us, this heat, _this_ heat -- " with a slow, ingenious writhe that half-pinned Jack to the mattress "and if I set a fire in you, 'tis no more than you do for me, and so this **chaleur** must be a product of _two_ commingled things, a _spark_ (myself) and its _fuel_ , being _you_ ," and Jack, impressed and amused by Sparrow's philosophickal treatise, distracted by his ardent caresses, and most definitely alight with his radiant nearness in the gloomy, heatless cabin, let the matter drop, for now.


End file.
